For any business, customer dealing is one of the most crucial parts of operations. Although this aspect of the business is often overlooked, with the right plan and strategy, you can build a loyal clientele.
As a small business owner, it took me nearly 3 years to realize that customers value interaction more than the product. A few years ago when I started my business, my only motivation and goal was to focus on my catalog, build the best product in the market, and ensure that my customers get to remember my brand.
While I was able to offer competitive prices and quality products, I failed to realize that customer service is equally important. Consequently, even within the next three years, I wasn’t able to build a brand.
If you are a business owner and want a loyal customer base without spending a lot of money, here is everything that can help you.
Value Your Customers
A survey by Zendesk states that 47% of customers want to feel heard and valued.
This means that customers closely observe how they are treated and this eventually helps them decide whether they want to continue buying from you. This means that to stay in the business, brands need to be more mindful about their treatment of customers.
So, how do you make a customer feel valued?
Well, the only way to make a customer feel valued is by integrating them into brand identity. This can be done by using customer feedback for marketing or solving a frequently reported issue. For instance, Spectrum is an internet provider serving customers in the USA. The brand has a 24/7 Spectrum customer service that ensures clients can report and inquire about issues anytime.
Set a Specific Goal
While building a customer service, you need to start by setting a goal. Most companies think customer service will help them boost sales. In reality, customer service is a very important part of customer experience that eventually helps boost customer loyalty.
Brands that heavily invest in customer service experience get to learn about the expectations of the customers so they can improve their brands. Some of the biggest brands today have used customer service to understand the requirements of their customers.
From small tech companies to big retail giants, most companies still rely on customer service for these details.
Build a Framework
Most people think that customer service is all about receiving complaint calls.
However, this notion is far from true. In reality, customer service is much more than complaints. It also helps with technical issues, understanding customers’ needs, and commonly reported issues and other details.
As a brand, you will get to know if your product is valuable for your customer, or if you need to change anything to make it better.
To make sure your brand gets to make the most out of your customer service, it is very important to build a good framework. Here is a basic checklist that can help you learn about all the features that your customer service must have:
- What kind of services will you offer?
- Do you want to resolve technical issues?
- Will your customer service cover online services i.e. billing?
- Do you have a feedback loop in place?
- Do you ask for customer requirements?
- What kind of feature will convince your customer to come back again?
Focus On Customer Feedback
Now that you have a basic customer service framework in place, it is time to focus on feedback. In most cases, feedback is the last step of the customer service. Generally, at the end of the call, when the agent is about to drop the call, they ask for a rating. However, in some cases, calls are recorded to ensure this feedback does not go to waste.
If your brand does not have a feedback loop in place, here are some of the simple questions that your customer support representative must ask:
- How would you rate our product?
- Will you buy our product again?
- What are some of the areas where our product lags?
- How can we improve our product?
Use Feedback for Innovation
This is one of the oldest, yet sure shot trick in the book, but you can use the feedback of the customers to design a new product.
How?
Well, clients generally report issues and complaints related to the products by using customer support. These complaints are an ideal way to highlight the weak components of a product. Apart from this, frequently reported issues are ideal for understanding the expectations of the customers.
With the right strategy, details from the feedback can easily be integrated to make a product or service better. For instance, you own a hair care brand and have a customer support line. One of the most frequently reported issues via your support line is that your hair care product line is not inclusive.
This means that you have a diverse client base and working on an inclusive product line will help you boost your sales instantly.
Simply put, customer service is often seen as a part of the purchase cycle. However, in reality, it drives sales, keeps the business afloat, and builds customer loyalty. With the above-mentioned strategies, you can also use your customer support to its full potential.